CHAPTER 89
Tom let Yoni help Patrick to the exit. He wanted to check one more time and make sure no men had been left behind in the enclosure. He looked around with disgust. No one should be here longer than they needed to be.
There was only one ditch left to check. He headed down the ramp when a hand reached from under the ramp and yanked on his leg. He barely managed to get his hands up in front of him to avoid slamming his face into the ground.
As he hit the ground, he rolled to his side. Dazed, he made it to his knees when a dark shadow lumbered at him from underneath the ramp.
The man sprinted across the ground towards him, a shovel raised above his head. Rolling out of the way, Tom just missed being pummeled.
The man came at Tom relentlessly. Tom crab-walked backwards, trying to stay out of the way. The man swung at him again and again and again, an inhuman scream accompanying each swing.
Tom rolled under a table and the man slammed the shovel into it. He pulled it back up but it was caught in the frame. With a curse, he yanked at it in a frenzy.
Tom scrambled to his feet and took his first look at his attacker.
Commander Gregory. Somehow, he had survived the initial attack, although he seemed to have lost his weapon. And he was bleeding profusely from a wound in his left shoulder.
With a cry of impotent rage, Gregory finally wrenched the shovel free and wheeled with it over his head.
“Stop,” Tom said quietly, training his gun on the raging man.
Gregory paused, the shovel still in the air above his head. He sneered. “A gun? What are you going to do? Shoot me? You don’t have it in you. You’re not that kind of man.”
“You don’t know me.”
“I know you,” Gregory said. “You’re weak. You’re not a man. You practically cried every time you saw blood.”
“And you’re a man? You held all the power and you wielded it like a weapon. You killed people for sport. You have no conscience. You’re no man. You’re the weak one.”
Bellowing, Gregory launched himself at Tom. Tom took a step back and fired, catching him in the right shoulder.
Gregory flew back with the force of the bullet, his shovel flying uselessly behind him. He fell, spread-eagle on the ground.
Tom walked over slowly, keeping his gun trained.
Blood seeped from the now matching wounds in Gregory’s shoulders, but didn’t stop the venom that spewed from his mouth. “Couldn’t even kill me, could you?” he taunted. “Why don’t you finish the job, you coward.”
Tom lowered his gun. He shook his head and looked Gregory square in the face. “I don’t need to. You’re going to go to jail and spend all your time with people who will happily punish you every day for the rest of your existence for your acts here.”
Tom smiled. “You were in charge here, but that’s over. Everything before now doesn’t matter. Because this is the last battle. In the end, I win.”